Playing with Fire | Yuzuru Hanyu

2. Wreckage

The relationship with Julia started out amazingly at first. His mom was happy that he was finally leaving the house and the girl often came over for dinner.

When his girlfriend was at the house, the reality was that she spent more time with his mother than she did with him but at the end of the day, Yuzuru was more thankful than hurt.

It was just that he preferred to stay by himself most of the day, even if he enjoyed their time together.

Going out with her was easy and careless, he could get lost in her smile and in her words, not understanding half of what she said most of the time and barely talking in return. The remaining fears about his English hadn't vanished in the slightest and the reality was that he barely had the opportunity to improve.

Yuzuru didn't care when it came with sweet kisses and cuddles, when it came with ice cream dates and milkshake outings.

He was starting to understand the true joys of being with someone else. It was easy to get lost in the intimacy of her touch and her smiles.

They kept it all fairly innocent for a good amount of time. Julia always whined when he broke their kisses as soon as they got more intense but the truth was that he couldn't get in the mood for anything else when his mother was right there, just a few rooms away. 

All of his previous experiences had been quick and in the refuge of hotel rooms or the Olympic Village, his mother far away and clueless about his adventures. Well, maybe not clueless, but that was something that he didn't want to think about.

Maybe he even wanted his experience with Julia to be special. She was his first real girlfriend after all. Something quick and rushed didn't seem the right way to keep it going.

Julia still seemed okay with everything despite her occasional complaints. Their relationship was strongly improving and he was enjoying his time with her more than he could have ever expected.

It was when he was finally cleared to start skating again that things started straining.

The thing was, Yuzuru's life was his skating and everything else came second. Being in his life meant understanding that.

As soon as he was cleared and his free time went scarce, their dates were drastically reduced to once per week, something that the woman didn't seem to enjoy in the slightest. To her credit, Julia never complained or said a word about it. Certainly, he could see that she wasn't as happy as before but nothing was ever said about the matter.

The circumstances of his incredibly unlucky streak would reveal themselves when he fell on his injured foot again. It seemed like history was repeating itself when he was once again prohibited from skating a mere week after returning.

Too early, his mother told him and unfortunately, he had to agree.

If only his misfortunes ended with his tragic proneness to injury, Yuzuru would've probably been fine but it was the way Julia answered to the circumstances that ended up hurting him more. 

"Look at the bright side, we have more time to be together."

As innocent as her words could be, they showed a clear sign that she wasn't someone for such a career-oriented person like him but even so, Yuzu knew well that the last thing he needed then was to get his heart shredded to pieces when his confidence in skating was completely gone.

He just nodded and accepted Julia's every request.

Being away from the ice wasn't just painful because he couldn't practice but also because he honestly loved the sport. Yuzuru felt completely out of it when he couldn't be on the ice. Skating was part of his identity and personality so it was easy to feel down when he couldn't practice it.